e filled with an expression of
incredulity; and a late moon, just showing its rim above the edge of
the mesa above them, flooded the slope with a brilliancy that made it
possible for Dale to see another expression in Sanderson's eyes--an
expression which told him that Sanderson thought his mind was wandering.

He laughed, weakly.

"You think I'm loco, eh? Well, I ain't. Barney Owen ain't Barney Owen
at all--he's Will Bransford. I found that out yesterday," he
continued, soberly, as Sanderson looked quickly at him. "I had some
men down to Tombstone way, lookin' him up.

"When old Bransford showed me the letter that you took away from me, I
knew Will Bransford was in Tombstone; an' when Mary sent that thousand
to him I set a friend of mine--Gary Miller--onto him. Gary an' two of
his friends salivated young Bransford, but he turned up, later, minus
the money, in Tombstone. Another friend of mine sent me word--an' a
description of him. Barney Owen is Bransford.

"Just what happened to Gary Miller an' his two friends has bothered me
a heap," went on Dale.

"They was to come this way, to help me in this deal. But they never
showed up."

Sanderson smiled, and Dale's eyes gleamed.

"You know what's become of him!" he charged. "That's where you got
that thousand you give to Mary Bransford--an' the papers, showin' that
young Bransford was due here. Ain't it?"

"I ain't sayin'," said Sanderson.

"Well," declared Dale, "Barney Owen is Will Bransford. The night
Morley got him drunk we went the limit with Owen, an' he talked enough
to make me suspicious. That's why I sent to Tombstone to find out how
he looked. We had the evidence to show the court at Las Vegas. We was
goin' to prove you wasn't young Bransford, an' then we was goin' to put
Owen out of the--"

Dale gasped, caught his breath, and stiffened.

Sanderson stayed with him until the dawn, sitting, quietly beside him
until the end. Then Sanderson got up, threw the body on Dale's horse,
mounted his own, and set out across the basin toward Okar.

CHAPTER XXXV

A DEAL IN LOVE

A few days later Mary Bransford, Sanderson, and Barney Owen were
sitting on the porch of the Double A ranchhouse, near where they had
sat on the day Mary and Owen and the Dale men had seen Sanderson riding
along the edge of the mesa in his pursuit of Williams and the others.

Mary and Sanderson were sitting rather close together at one end of the
porch; Barney Owen